Youth and Corporate Leaders Launch Global Youth Traffic Safety Month

This is stating the obvious, but young drivers are way more at risk of motor vehicle crashes and fatalities than other demographics. Noticing this, the National Organizations for Youth Safety (NOYS) have partnered with the government, corporate leaders, young people, and other partners to launch Global Youth Traffic Safety Month, a program that brings attention to the epidemic and aims to steer young drivers into making smarter decisions behind the wheel of vehicles they're operating.

"We all share a responsibility to help keep our youngest and most inexperienced drivers safe when they get behind the wheel," U.S. Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood said in a statement. "Global Youth Traffic Safety Month is an opportunity to raise awareness about the importance of good driving habits as we enter the summer months, and I thank all of the youth leaders across the country who are making an effort to improve road safety in their communities."NOYS cites shocking statistics for young drivers: July 23 and July 30, 2011, tied for the deadliest days of the year for those 15 to 20 years old at 25 deaths per day. Sixty percent of those who died weren't wearing seatbelts. Twenty-one percent of those who died in that age bracket had blood-alcohol contents of 0.08 or higher. It's illegal for underagers to have a BAC or more than 0.01, which is basically a free pass for mouthwash. And, finally, more than 1,200 underagers were killed in 2011 from drinking and driving.Numbers released from 2012 last week show a 5.3-percent uptick in fatalities.To combat the numbers, the National Transportation Safety Board is putting out an infromation campaign, the Ad Council has started an outreach program in Teen Vogue magazine, and everyone from individual state representatives to insurance companies to AT&T have come up with information programs, including "It Can Wait," a short documentary about teens who lost their lives while texting and driving.We have a piece on what Toyota is doing on its way, but in the meantime, here are some links for what some major organizations are doing to prevent teen accidents and fatalities, the results of hubris, peer pressure, inexperience, and alcohol: